Season of the Maestros: Opening Night

Tuesday, October 9, 7:30 pm
Community Arts Center, Williamsport

Conducted by Rebecca Miller. Dvorak's Te Deum and Ralph Vaughan Williams's Five Mystical Songs, featuring the Susquehanna Valley Chorale (conducted by William Payn) and soloists Jake and Jill Gardner. Pre-Concert Talk with Dr. Gary Boerckel, 7:00 pm in CAC Capitol Lounge. Sponsors: Lycoming College and Friends of the Symphony. Tickets can be ordered at the CAC box office by phone (570-326-2424 / 800-432-9382) or online through the CAC.

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NEW DANCE AND OLD SONGS. On Tuesday, October 9, voices will fill the Community Arts Center as the Susquehanna Valley Chorale joins the WSO on Opening Night, the first concert for the WSO’s “Season of the Maestros.”

The Opening Night concert will also be the first WSO performance to be conducted by Rebecca Miller, one of the finalists in the WSO conductor search for a new music director.

Originally from California, Miller was cited as one of “Four at the Forefront” in The Guardian’s (U.K.) recent article on women conductors. She has been repeatedly praised by reviewers in such U.K. publications as The Times, The Strad, and Musical Opinion, for her “new insights into old works” and her broad-ranging repertoire. She has worked with prominent living composers and is thankful to have the support of major international conductors Marin Alsop, Hugh Wolff, Sir Charles Mackerras, and Sir Roger Norrington.

Miller is also Music Director of The New Professionals Orchestra, an ensemble she founded in 1999. The NPO has been acclaimed internationally for its innovative programming and exceptional quality of performance. Their 2004 debut CD, Lou Harrison: For Strings (Mode Records), was supported by a grant from the Aaron Copland Fund for Music and was highly rated in The Times (U.K.).

Miller and the WSO will perform Dvorak’s Eighth Symphony and New Era Dance by Aaron Jay Kernis (b. 1960). The Philadelphia-born musician is the youngest-ever composer to receive the Pulitzer Prize. The Dance was “dedicated and written in celebration of a new era of leadership at the New York Philharmonic, in anticipation of the new millennium to come in the year 2000, in hope for a time of imperative political and social change in this country,” said Kernis when he was commissioned to create the piece in 1993. He describes the six-minute piece as “proudly New Yorkish,” with a mix of electronic samples, urban sound effects, and quotes from the cosmopolitan soundscapes of Leonard Bernstein, George Gershwin, Steve Reich, and Edgar Varese.

Dvorak’s music will return to the stage as the Susquehanna Valley Chorale joins the WSO to perform the celebratory masterwork, Te Deum, the oratorio based on fourth century Latin hymns and prayers of praise and thanksgiving. Over time, Te Deum has become one of Dvorak’s most durable creations, if not one of the best choral works of this type. It has been described as energetic and rhythmically futuristic, yet reverent and celebratory. Soloists Jake Gardner and Melanie Vaccari will sing parts one writer said “will stir you in a spiritual language beyond arias and folk songs.”

The SVC/WSO will also perform Ralph Vaughan Williams’s Five Mystical Songs. The Songs, written in 1911 and first performed that year, are settings of devotional poems by the metaphysical poet George Herbert (1593-1633). Vaughan Williams (1872-1958) labeled himself a “Christian agnostic,” but this did not prevent him from using verse of Biblical inspiration for this and many other compositions.

The Songs were written to be performed together as one work. The first four are personal meditations, particularly the third, in which the soloist takes the lead and the chorus has a supporting role. The fifth song, “Antiphon,” is a triumphant hymn sung by the chorus alone. It is sometimes performed on its own as a church anthem for choir and organ: “Let all the world in every corner sing.”

William Payn is the director of the Susquehanna Valley Chorale. A composer in his own right, Payn is the Director of Choral Studies at Bucknell University. His choirs have performed around the world, and he has led them to international recognition for their creative interpretations of choral literature from the past five centuries. His many compositions are performed virtually every week in the United States and abroad. Bucknell’s popular “Candlelight Service of Carols,” features Payn’s Chapel Choir and Rooke Chapel Ringers. The Emmy-nominated program has been televised on PBS since 1988.

“We always look forward to getting together with the SVC,” said a WSO staffer. “We also hope everyone will come out and welcome Rebecca Miller to the Williamsport stage.”

SPECIAL NOTE: The WSO and SVC will reprise Dvorak and Vaughan Williams for the SVC’s Opening Night on Saturday, October 13, 8:00 p.m., at the Weis Center for the Performing Arts, Bucknell University, Lewisburg. Tickets are $15 and available at (570) 523-1041 or by e-mailing svc@svcmusic.org.